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The Delhi High Court has reserved its order for January 4 on Future Group’s plea for termination of the ongoing arbitration proceedings with Amazon Inc following an order of the Competition Commission of India passed in December. 

The matter was being heard by a bench of Justice Amit Bansal.

Senior Advocates Harish Salve and Mukul Rohatgi mentioned the plea for an urgent hearing before the Division Bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Jyoti Singh citing that the Tribunal was scheduled to hear the matter on January 5.

As such, a single-judge bench of Justice Amit Bansal took up the case for hearing on late-Monday afternoon.

Kishore Biyani’s Future Group had approached the Delhi based Arbitral Tribunal as well seeking termination of ongoing arbitration before it, however, the request was not accommodated by the Tribunal.

According to Rohatgi, appearing Future Coupons Pvt Ltd, the Tribunal, citing its busy schedule had agreed to accommodate Future Group’s plea for termination of proceedings after carrying out the main hearing in the case between January 5 and 7 on the issue of damages to be ascertained.

Rohatgi pointed out to the Court that the Tribunal's decision was in the teeth of the CCI's order suspending the deal - and in complete defiance of the order of an Indian authority.

The Future Group pressed that with CCI approval for the 2019 deal suspended, the investment deal is rendered invalid and the arbitration proceedings arising from the same cannot stand.

Rohatgi termed the arbitration proceedings “futile” and “irrelevant” in light of the CCI order, though the CCI has merely kept approval for the deal in abeyance and has not quashed it yet.

CCI has however noted in its order that Amazon had hidden important strategic information while seeking approval for its investment in Future Coupons Pvt Ltd.

Amazon has also been granted time by CCI to make fresh application for approval following which the Commission will reconsider the approval for the deal.

Sr. Adv. Gopal Subramanium representing Amazon on the other hand argued that as arbitration clauses and agreements are independent of main contracts, the arbitration would not perish simply because a regulatory approval has been suspended.

Subramanium also defended the Tribunal to say that the Tribunal did not reject Future Group’s plea to hear the termination application altogether but had merely agreed to accommodate hearing on the application after the scheduled hearings.

The Rs. 24,000 cr stake sale between Future Group and Reliance Industries was stayed by an Emergency Arbitrator in October 2020, and the validity of this order was affirmed by the Supreme Court in August 2021.

While this merger remained stayed, Future Group moved CCI accusing Amazon of withholding pertinent information, leading to the CCI order of December.

Cause Title: Future Group vs Amazon Inc